Melancholy Nights
by OhGeeNein
Summary: After a tragic accident and the loss and betrayal of many of his friends, Soma is left an empty shell of who he once was. But assistance comes from extraordinary places, and from extraordinary people. It's his final year, and will he finally find solace after such great loss? Will he have a rose-coloured third year?
1. Chapter 1

Melancholy Nights

Their final year had come. Their final year of hell, of abuse, of the competition towards greatness. Their final year. However such progress had not come at a heavy price. Of the many who had started, few had survived. Now all that remained were a few students, the few students who had overcome the odds and made it to the top. This is the story of two very special, yes very special indeed, students of the Totsuki 92nd generation.

The air was filled with the acrid tinge of smoke, the blazing mixes of color from the fires that raged. Screams could be heard, shouts too, for loved ones, for family, for friends. In that fire, the silhouettes of two people, a man and a woman, could be seen. The woman, trapped beneath the car, begging the man to save himself, the man, in complete opposite of his famous optimism and fun demeanor that had won him acclaim during his years at Totsuki, staunchly refusing to do so with tears streaming down his smudged and scratched face.

"Soma, run for it! Save yourself, both of us don't need to die here!" Megumi knew that both of them wouldn't survive this accident, this cruel twist of fate that had brought them so far but had brought their dreams crashing down at the last second. "You shut up! I'm going to save you so you shut up and stay still!" Soma responded as tears rolled down his ash-stained face. The famously stauch Soma had finally cracked under the prospect of losing one of his dearest friends. As the flames closed in, Megumi had made up her mind. She owed too much to this one man, this man who had captured her heart and her stomach. With the last of the energy in her body, she shoved Soma away from the flames, screaming "JUST GO." At last, Megumi's strength gave out, and her heart, which had beat valiantly for the sake of her life, did stop.


	2. Chapter 2

When Soma came to, he was in a sea of white, a white that contrasted with his charred and burnt features. It appeared to be morning and shafts of sunlight, like so much wisps of dreams and the vestiges of reality, filtered through the curtains that shaded the windows of his hospital room. The dust floating in the air caught the light and to the eyes of an observer, seemed as if the particles of dust were participating in a merry dance. However, Soma noticed none of this. Still in denial about the passing of one of his dearest friends, his eyes took nothing in, nor did they let anything out. The sparkle, the kindle of flame that had burned through his first two years at Totsuki had been quenched. Quenched at the hands of fate, who had extracted from him a part of his own being, a part that the extraction of would remain burned into his memory until the day he died.

As he came to and sat upright in his bed, the presence of other beings in the room came into being. It was his father, Joichiro, sitting at the foot of his bed, with a look of utter loss etched onto his craggy features. "Hey...Dad….it's a lie right? I was dreaming right? Where's Megumi? Is she okay? WHERE IS SHE?!" Soma suddenly shouted through broken sobs. "My fault….all my fault…" Joichiro remained quiet. The image of his own son, always so spirited and optimistic, with such a broken spirit and mind was almost too much to bear. However, he was his father, and had a given duty to offer Soma the island in the roiling sea of his emotions that Soma could reside upon until both his mind and body came to.

After two weeks of hospitalization, Yukihira Soma was finally released back into the general public. However, he had only recovered his physical attributes. His mental state would forever be changed, and his classmates took notice of this. They took notice of the King of Totsuki, who had regaled them with his laid-back attitude, his friendliness to all, and his skill in culinary arts, had fallen. And fallen he had. After his return to Polar Star and Totsuki as a whole, Soma, though he did indeed participate in classes, his cooking no longer had any ingenuity whatsoever. His food was the type of food that merely fulfilled requirements, no longer the packed bombs of action nor risk that Soma had produced in the past. The spark of creativity had been quenched. This in particular concerned one female individual, called the "God Tongue" by the denizens of Totsuki, both feared and respected throughout the academy as a harsh critic and an even harsher human being. Erina Nakiri. She particularly had disliked Soma from their first year in the high school division of the academy, but over the time they had spent together, both competing, judging, and harboring a rivalry, Erina herself was quite alarmed of Soma's drastic change and saddened by Megumi's passing, as she had acknowledged Megumi as quite the skilled cook and as one of her acquaintances, of which she had few. Therefore, Erina began preparations to make overtures toward Soma, to overcome their bitter rivalry in order to re-kindle that spark of ingenuity, that sparkle that had always had been so irritating in their pasts, but now had become so endearing to her own perception of the now nearly grown boy.

However, the passing of Megumi would not be the only bombshell dropped upon the fragile metropolis that was Soma's mind. As he returned to Totsuki, he learned of a betrayal. A betrayal so subtle that to the ignorant observer it seemed as if nothing had changed at all. However, the corruption of Takumi Aldini had played out during Soma's own hospitalization. And as Soma returned, he was faced with a very sober Isshiki Satoshi who quite simply said "Soma, the rest of Polar Star has been expelled by Takumi Aldini. He's coming for you next" before walking away.


End file.
